Harness (Death's own pale horses) and scholarly plough the sands
by reading-is-in
Summary: Or, The (Mis)adventures of Bobby and Rufus in rural America. (Title from Kipling, 'The Old Men' (1902)
1. Chapter 1

Harness (Death's own pale horses) and scholarly plough the sands.

Or,

The (Mis) Adventures of Bobby and Rufus in Rural America.

1980.

1.

The vigilante doesn't stick around. He offers some curt consolation for Karen, but he's already packing his weapons and – things – before Bobby can grasp what he's done:

"Sorry man, but the feds have been too close for my comfort since the border, and you know they ain't itchin to hand a brother a fair trial in a town like this. No offense,"

"No," says Bobby. Smoke from the pyre smears gray whorls against the pale dusk. It burns Bobby's dry eyes.

"You let that burn down to ash, right? You got that?"

"Got it."

"Look, uh…" the stranger shifts, clearly out of his element now that the Thing is gone and body burning. "There's a PO box down in Lincoln. 80979. You need some advice on keeping the bastards outta this place, drop me a line there. I'll get it when I get."

His departing exhaust is absorbed by the funeral smoke.

For a week he does nothing. Puts the closed sign up on the shop. Occasionally remembers that nightmares exist. Drinks. The crockery Karen last washed is dried rigid to the rack. Her cardigan hangs on a chair back. The burned the rugs soaked with her blood on her pyre, but there are drops dried into the bedroom floorboards from their last fight.

He should have told her whatever she wanted to hear.

On the seventh day Cilla Mills knocks the door, casserole in hand and teenage daughter in tow. Mrs. Mills is the sherrif's wife, and an intolerable gossip. She's concerned because nobody's seen him or Karen and the shop's been closed, and just wanted to check that everything -

"Oh my sweet Lord Mr. Singer you look terrible. What happened?"

He tells her Karen left him because even if he is technically her murderer, if he spends the rest of his life in a jail cell he'll never have a hope of finding answers.

"Oh my," says Mrs. Mills, eyes dancing with delight, "But the two of you just seemed so ihappy/i together."

"I thought so too," he says. The teenager – Julie – Judy? – regards him with serious brown eyes and ignores her mother.

iWhat was it?/i he writes on the postcard addressed to Lincoln, and signs it, iSalvage yard, SD/i.

A second week passes. Cilla Mills has been back twice, under the pretense of bringing food but really to grill him for information about Karen's departure. Because he's a masochist, he says they fought over children, and that no, Karen doesn't want to be contacted.

The parish priest, Father Stephen, stops by to talk about counselling. Bobby hasn't seen the inside of a church for twenty years or more, but Karen was a regular. Bobby looks at the man, with his round earnest face and his dog collar peeking modestly from between the cut of his corduroy sweater, his soft round belly testament to a life behind desks and pulpits. His memory offers up the image of the mad vigilante, fierce, sharp and dark, all hard lines and rapidfire Latin as the Thing surged out o his dying wife. Father Stephen doesn't stay.

"Still closed," he snaps when the work phone won't stop ringing.

"Like I told you, it was a demon." The voice clicks into place right away.

"No, really," says Bobby, then: "How did you get this num ber?"

The man chuckles. "I tracked that thing all the way from Iowa to your place, Singer – ain't beyond me to use a phone book."

"Oh."

"And yeah, really. It was a demon. As in liteal, out of hell, human-possessing evil spirit. Ain't that common to meet em topside this century – that's why it took me a while to make the connections. Sorry again that I, uh, didn't get to it sooner."

"It's not your fault," Bobby says automatically. "How did you – uh, what did you do to it?

"Exorcised it. Sent it back to hell. It's what I do. That and assorted nasties that most folks with better sense wouldn't touch with a pole."

"So it's dead?"

"Technically it was dead already."

"Can – can it come back?" Can it do to anyone else what it…?

"Probably not that one." Pause. "Look Singer. Most people who come up against this stuff can't forget it fast enough. Pretty rare for anyone to get in touch once I'm out of their hair. But I figured there was something different about you, and it looks like I was right. You ain't the type who can just stick their head in the sand. So I'll ask you how much you wanna know, but I'll warn you first – once you're in this, you're in it. I ain't known a single man does what I do who got up and walked away. So – last chance – how much do you want to know?"

"Everything," Bobby hears himself say. "All of it."

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

Bobby looks again at his scrawl on the notebook paper: 214 Eastern Ave. He shrugs and kills the engine. Apparently the vigilante wants to meet him in broad daylight at an all-American diner. A faded sign displays a milkshake, burger and the name _Lora's Lunchbox_ in blocky letters. What had he been expecting, the Bat Cave?

It's a little after 11, too early for the lunch rush, and the only other customers are an elderly couple and a family in matching t-shirts proclaiming their love for Florida. Mom, Dad and a couple of kiddies arguing over ice cream: it's obscene, what with Karen dead. There's a middle aged woman behind the till, and a younger waitress who approaches when Bobby takes a booth.

"What'll you have?" she asks without interest.

"Uh…"

"If you're staying you gotta order." She casts an eye over Bobby and he realises he probably looks like a bum.

"Coffee," he says: "Black."

"Coming right up."

A couple of people look when the vigilante enters, twenty minutes late - not because he's openly carrying, but because Sioux Falls is, to be frank, a pretty White city, and some people are bigots are some are just curious. It isn't something Bobby's given much thought before.

"Rufus!" says the woman behind the counter, brightening notably. "Ain't seen you in a dog's year. You look good."

"Thanks Lora."

"You want a beer?"

"Two," he gestures briefly to Bobby and slides into the booth across from him.

"Rufus?" Bobby raises both eyebrows.

"Rufus Turner," says the man shortly. "You're Robert Singer of Singer Salvage. Bobby to the locals."

"So are you – some kind of PI?"

Turner glances around. The family are packing up and leaving, and the elderly couple have lost interest.  
"I'm a hunter," Turner says quietly. "You know demons are real. So are ghosts, werewolves, various monsters, witchcraft….I hunt them. If they can be killed, I kill em. If they can't…." he shrugs, letting Bobby infer from experience.

"Rufus lifted a hex my ex-husband cast on the diner," says Lora, coming over herself to set their beers down.

"You need anything else you let me know. It's on the house." Rufus nods, dismissing her.

"What – wait- _monsters?_" Bobby asks. "As in Dracula, Frankenstein?"

"Hell no!" Turner looks pissed, as though the very concept is an insult to his professional pride. "Pretty much everything the movies tell you is bullshit. And don't even get my started on that Anne Rice lady. She's either possessed, or crazier than a shithouse rat. Might have to look into that…" he muses.

"Are you – some kind of secret service?" Bobby asks. "I mean do you work for the government?"

Turner laughs so hard he practically chokes on his beer. "For the government! Naw, Singer, no-one employs us. There's a kind of a - network …places hunters go, folks you know you can call on for info or help in an emergency. But so far as organization goes that's it."

"Are you crazy?" Probably not the smartest question, but really it's all Bobby's got left.

"All hunters are at least a little crazy," Turner shrugs, then his face hardens. "Besides, folks got their  
reasons. Maybe you'd recognise a few of them."

Bobby hesitates then nods. "I understand."

"No, you don't. But you're willing and you sure as hell want a shot at the evil that's out there after what it did to your wife, am I right?"

"I…I think so."

"Alright then," Turner nods. Bobby wants to ask how he'd gotten started but senses it would be an extremely bad idea. Turner reaches down for the battered holdall he's slung under the table and produces a huge stack of local newspapers that start out crisp and get increasingly tattered. "Start readin'. First step to a successful hunt is a solid investigation. I gotta go, but I'll call you around 6 tonight. You're lookin' for anything related to Baker's Pharmacy over on 8th Street."

"Wait – there's a demon in the pharmacy?"

Turner snorts. "Man, don't be ridiculous. I ain't startin you on no demon hunt, that's high-level. Consider this the training wheels of the hunting world. Baker's Pharmacy is haunted."

Turner has several more stacks of papers in his car: a beat-up , Bobby realises he didn't ask for a phone number. Their relationship is utterly one-sided. If Turner decides to ditch him at any time, or if Bobby wants information, there is nothing he can do about it. He supposes you owe a man that once he saves your life and all.

The latest issues of the _Argus Leader_ and _Sioux Falls Weekly_ are heavily pen-marked. Seems a pharmacy assistant died last Wednesday. Girl went into the back room to fetch some stock, and when she hadn't returned after several minutes the pharmacist went after her. She was dead of a heart attack. Massive amounts of the antihistamine Seldane were found in her system, which had been reported to cause irregular heartbeat in some patients. Family and friends reported shock: she was young, happy, had everything to live for. In Bobby's experience that's pretty much what people always say after a suicide. In the past, he wouldn't have given the story more than the obligatory sympathetic skim, but Turner obviously thinks there's more to it. Scrawled in the margin of the Eagle in messy capital letters is a note: PHARMACIST SAYS DRUG NOT STOCKED. DEFF. WEIRD.

Huh.

Bobby starts to work back through the pile of papers, feeling vaguely ridiculous. The next mention of Bakers is an advert in the back of the Daily a few months ago. Then nothing. Why would there be? As months turn into years there are issues missing. It's a shop. Then suddenly he opens the _Argus_from today's date, 1976.  
Another mysterious suicide. Same room.

Bobby reads the article carefully. Seems this was in the time of a different pharmacist, uncle to the current Baker. The piece is terser: there's no mention of what drug or a coroner's report. He checks for a copy of the _Weekly_ but there's nothing in Turner's stacks for the whole month. Damn. He circles the article and puts that paper aside.

By the time Turner calls, 6pm exactly, he's established a definite pattern. At least four people have died in the pharmacy now owned by the Baker family, the first in 1958. There's more: in '57 the pharmacist, a Mr Gregory Bragg, lost his license. That last is a short notice in the back of the _Argus_, no details. Bobby almost misses it, and adrenalin jolts through him as he processes implications: it's the first real emotion he's felt since Karen died that isn't pain or rage. At some level, he understands that he's peering into a very deep rabbit hole here. But he'd said, 'Everything', and he meant it.

"I can't believe no-one's noticed the pattern," he says when Turner calls.

"Oh they've noticed alright," Turner says. "People notice the supernatural all the time. They just don't believe it. Most people are damn good at believing what they want to."

"So – what do we do now? Does this Bragg want revenge–"

"Woah woah hold your horses," Turner cuts him off. "Don't go putting your slant on things till you've gathered the evidence. Otherwise you'll be drawin' conclusions you want to see – and a bad call in this game gets people dead."

"So – what do we do next?"

"You do nothing. _I_ am going to go talk the Baker guy." Pause. "If you want I guess you come with. Just don't – talk too much."

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

"See the journalist who talked to Baker was pretty freaked. She tells me Baker ain't stocked this drug for over five years due to lack of demand. Editor told her to leave it out of the article," Turner snorts. "See Singer, people delete the parts that don't fit with their own story. In the newspaper and in their minds," Turner shakes his head, looking pleased with his own rhetoric.

"So now we go to Baker."

"Right. Follow the trail backwards." Turner taps the wheel for emphasis and ignores the horn reprimanding him for a late indication. The Arrow groans at the sharp turn. It's a shitty car, and Turner drives like he knows it. The backseats and most of the floor space are crammed with papers, sealed bags of various disturbing 'evidence', fast food wrappers , cups, a screwdriver, a tape recorder, and unidentified objects. The weapons are sealed in a lock box in the trunk.

"Hey," Bobby says suddenly. "I got a truck on the yard I was fixing up for a customer. He bailed, but the things nearly done. Lots of space in the back, good mileage, handles well."

"And?" Turner's glance is sharp.

"Well I was just thinkin…if we had to go further out…we could take that. Or you could…."

"That some kind of charity?" His tone is sharper.

"No."

"Good."

Pause.

"Might be useful on forest hunts," Turner offers generously.

"Alright."

"Alright then."

The pharmacy is closed, but Turner has Arnold Baker's address from the journalist who talked to him for the iLeader/i. They park in front of a good-sized but unkempt house set back from the street.

"Take this," Turner hands Bobby a wallet. Bobby opens it to reveal a police ID for detective Franklin Dorian.

"You want me to impersonate a cop." Bobby isn't naïve. He hasn't been imagining that Turner's arms are all licensed and registered (reason: monster hunting) and his car insurance up to date. But impersonating a cop is by far the most illegal thing Bobby's ever considered. The ID photo is a balding man who must be nearing retirement. "This guy looks nothing like me."

"Sure he does. Got a beard and everything….look, Baker ain't even gonna look at it."

"You impersonate cops a lot?"

"Cops, FBI, Center for Disease Control - and a couple of times a National Park ranger. And whattayaknow: still at liberty."

"Right…." Bobby feels his eyes narrow. His faith in the institutions of his country slides another notch.

"Just follow my lead."

A slight man under thirty answers Turner's knock. He's nervous and drawn, an arrhythmic twitch at the left corner of his mouth.

"Mr. Baker," Turner flashes an ID card just long enough for the logo to be visible. Bobby copies with much less style. "We'd like to ask you a few questions about the death of your employee Annabel Jaffrey."

"I – I already talked to the police," Baker swallows. "The coroner ruled suicide - you think I'm crazy, right? Like my uncle?"

"No we don't," says Turner. "But we do think you might have some information that could help with the investigation. Gotta follow procedure, you understand."

Baker's eyes flick to Bobby, so he nods, keeping his mouth shut. Baker steps back, and leads them into a living room. The furniture isn't cheap but there's dust on the surfaces. No signs of women or children, for which Bobby is grateful. A wall has been knocked through to an office area, a desk with neat piles of paper in trays, a telephone and a home computer.

"Business doin alright," observes Turner.

"It was," Baker shrugs and sits down hard. Bobby's having a hard time seeing this guy as any kind of suspect. He looks up , suddenly, appealing: "someone killed Bell, didn't they?"

"Ms. Jaffrey had large amounts of Terfenadine in her bloodstream when she died. That's marketed as the antihistamine Seldane."

"Right," Baker nods. "We didn't stock that. There's hardly any demand for it any more – the side effects outweigh the benefits."

"Did Ms. Jaffrey have any enemies that you know of? Anyone who might want to harm her?"

"None. Everybody loved her. She was good at her job. Getting married in the summer," Turner spread his hands. "There's just no reason for it."

"Your uncle owned the pharmacy before you."

"Right."

"He retired at 50." Turner glances at his notepad. "That's pretty young."

"He….his health wasn't the best."

"That have anything to do with the last death on the premises? 1976?"

Pause.

"You know we..." Baker swallows. his eyes travel from Turner to Bobby and back again. the only word Bobby has for his expression is _haunted_. "We all thought he was crazy. That the stress of the job got to him."

"Now why would you think that?" Turner leans forward, intent, a hound dog on the scent now.

Bake hesitates. A line comes to Bobby:

"Anything you can tell us, no matter how strange it sounds, will help us get to the bottom of this."

"We thought he was crazy because he said….a ghost killed his assistant."

* * *

Gerald Baker II, the first Baker to operate Baker's pharmacy, currently resides at Falls View Rest Home. Bobby's skin creeps the moment he crosses the threshold: white walls, slow movement, smell of disinfectant and industrial cooking. A nurse is pushing a frail old woman in a wheelchair across the foyer, voice too loud and cheerful. It hits Bobby, sudden, that if he gets old, Karen won't be there.

Baker's only 54, so Bobby figures his admission is on account of his mental state. They observe him through the window to the dayroom as he stares vacantly at the television, hands moving restlessly in his lap. Bobby wonders whether he or Baker had the more normal to learning that nightmares exist.

"Ain't an either or," says Turner cheerfully as though reading his thoughts: "Seen hunters go that way late in life."

Bobby frowns. "How old are you, anyway, Turner?"

Turner gives him the side-eye: "Old enough."

Bobby rolls his eyes. "Cliché."

"Why mess with the classics?"

"We can't talk here," says the elder Baker fearfully when they approach him and flash their badges. "They – the staff won't like it."

"You gotta private room?" asks Turner, kinder than Bobby's ever seen him.

"Sure," Baker nods, jerky. 'Room' is an overstatement. It's more like a cupboard, sterile white bed with slots for guard rails, thin cupboard, one chair. Baker paces, and Turner stands still and waiting, so Bobby sits.

"I heard that girl died," Baker blurts, nervous. "It was on the news."

"Uh huh," Turner says. "You know anything about it?"

Baker stares at them.

Turner sits down on the edge of the bed.

"I'm delusional, you know," Baker says apologetically. "Paranoid disorder, non-violent type. Quite rare when unaccompanied by schizophrenia."

"Well," Turner shrugs. "Why don't you tell us what you ithink/i you know, and let us decide what to do with it."

Baker heaves a sigh. "It's the ghost of Jackson Wellesley. He's been haunting the building since Gregory Bragg – my predecessor, you know - gave him the wrong drug and it killed him."

"That so," says Turner, like Baker's just told him the football score.

"I've seen him," Baker admits. "He's different dead. He was always a quiet man. Peaceful. Now…he's face…" he shuddered.

"He's angry," Turner says "Ghosts go that way."

"He killed my assistant."

"Seems odd," Turner muses, "That the ghost would be going after assistants if the pharmacist killed him."

"What do you expect, I'm delusional," Baker shrugs in turn.

"Well, that's most helpful," Turner claps him on the shoulder. "You have a good day sir."

"That's – that ain't right." Bobby shakes his head, once, a quick jerk to the side as he yanks the car door open. He doesn't know why. Baker distressed him.

"I'm willing to bet the assistant was the killer," says Turner serenely. "Pharmacist covered. Love, blackmail, who knows. Point is, now he we got the ghost's name, we just got to find where the guy's buried."

"No I mean -!" Bobby gestures. "About Baker. Locked up like that, believing he's crazy."

"Look Singer," Turner brakes a red light and looks at Bobby. "On this job, you two kinds of shit that will potentially mess you up: evil and the people who've met it. You gotta be able to put iboth/i of them to the side if you're gonna do it right. Otherwise, you become a casualty."

"But-"

"But nothing."

Turner's right. Bobby knows it, deep down, and starts to wonder seriously if he can do this. Then he remembers the Thing in Karen's eyes, the satisfaction as it flowed through her body, fitting her fingers and toes to itself with a satisfied snap.

"Alright," he says.

"Good," says Turner.

Pause.

"So – where are we headed?"

"County records office. Gonna find out where this sonofabitch is buried. Then we dig him up – you can help with that part – pour salt on the bones, and the burn them."

"Um and that – that gets rid of ghosts."

"Either that or it sends em to where they belong. Which, before you ask, I don't know. I don't iwant/i to know. Got too much damn responsibility already."

They pull up outside the records office – which is closed, and Turner picks the lock with a hex key. The door swings open almost too easily. He observes as Turner goes through the brief process of locating the grave they need.

"Nothin to do now but wait till night," he dusts his hands off. "You got anything to drink at your place? I'm sick of that damn diner."

Twenty minutes later, Bobby's taking the last of the beer out of the fridge, and realising it'll be the first drink he takes since Turner came to town. Turner's making himself at home, taking in Bobby's large miscellaneous library:

"So you're some bookworm, huh? History, geography...iThe Socio-Cultural Context of the Old Testament/i."

"I like to read," says Bobby a little defensively. Of course there's a large selection of books on mechanics – theory and practice – but most of his shelves are taken up with books he picked up here and there, all ages and quality, just because they looked interesting.

"No fiction," Turner notes.

"I prefer reality," says Bobby, and shakes his head a little at how that sounds now. "Useful books."

"Hunter over in Delaware kept a big old library of useful books," Turner muses: "Used to swing by when I needed somethin' hard to come by. Dead last month, and it figured she was out on the edge of nowhere." He eyes Bobby. "You should read her books."

"Well – I mean – wouldn't anyone mind?" Bobby puts two beers on the table. "Family or something?"

"No family. She got damn old for a hunter, oldest I heard. Look," Turner leans forward, all compressed energy: "Look, local kids called this broad a witch, which was ironic. If no-one takes those books and makes use of em, place is just gonna get trashed and then condemned by the city. she'd want a hunter to have em."

"I suppose…it would be educational."

"For sure. See this, Singer, is what we in the business call a cakewalk. Nothin' easier than a salt-and-burn. But there are things out there that need more than salt to get rid of them. Werewolves can only be killed with a silver bullet to the heart. Djinn takes a knife dipped in lamb's blood. And that's just scratching the surface – the obvious stuff. There's more out there than any of us know, and now…." For the first time, Turner looks briefly unsure of his himself.

"Now?" Prompts Bobby.

"Well," Turner shakes his head, shakes it off: "I just exorcised two demons in six months, and heard a hunter down in Arkansas did another. Demons used to be rare. Like, two in a lifetime rare. Could be nothing, could be something, but I don't like it." He shrugs. "Point is, hunters need you book loving types much as we need guns. You hear what I'm saying?"

Bobby does, but it still comes over as mildly offensive: "You want to give me the easy and safe stuff."

Turner snorts: "Man, I'm about to make you dig up a coffin with a shovel. Tomorrow you can tell me that was easy."

* * *

Thirty-two ain't twenty, but Bobby's spent most of his life in manual labor and considers himself fit enough. Or he did, before they get to the third hour of turning over the dirt, Turner deliberately slacking and using the time to regale Bobby with stories about the Life. He calls it the Life – what he does, what these people do. Bobby guesses it's only a job if you get paid. Turner talks a lot but he doesn't say much – as in, nothing personal. Bobby learns that his closest call was with something called a Rugaru, that his greatest victory was being part of a group that took out what they think were the last vampires in America. That he once had to put down a rabid zombie hamster which an eight-year-old reanimated using her big sister's Wiccan paraphernalia. He doesn't learn where he comes from, or why.

"Paydirt!" Turner's shovel hits something and clangs portentously. Bobby leans on his shovel, panting he feels like he's sweated out two weeks' worth of alcohol abuse. They scatter the dirt from the top of the coffin and prise the lid open. There's not much to see: no flesh and rotting organs. Grey bones suggesting the loose outline of smallish man. It looks – harmless.

Turner liberally coats the skeleton with salt from a satchel, then orders,

"Gasoline,"

and Bobby douses the remains. Turner lights a match, and says, "Alright Jackson Wellesley, time for you to shuffle off this coil."

Then, before Bobby's eyes, the next impossible thing happens – Turner flies through the air exactly as if he's been tossed, dropping the match so it lights the grass around the grave. He fetches up against a headstone with an audible crack and a pained exhalation, choking,

"Salt rounds!"

They briefed for this. Bobby grabs the shotgun from the grass and turns, and advancing on him is the ghost of Jackson Wellesley. He – it – looks like a man, short and slightly hunched, but not all there, flickery and washed out like a projection from an old-style film reel. Its face is stretched, tormented, eyes bloodshot and hollow, mouth a black hole in its face.

Bobby freezes.

the ghost extends an arm, and he feels something seize in his chest. it's his heart: squeezing, stuttering, and for a second he thinks, what the hell, maybe he'll go to wherever Karen's gone, but he's never really been the lay down and die type, and his finger is squeezing the trigger as the instant passes. Pellets of rock salt explode from the shotgun barrel, and the ghost disintegrates. Turner's on his feet, heedless of the small flames stuttering in the mulch, and tosses a second match into the open grave. The ghost reappears, screeches, claws, but as the flames devour its skeleton its going up in smoke – becoming – nothing.

"Well," Turner puffs out, stamps on the flames that the damp mud hasn't killed. "Not bad. Not bad for a first time, Singer."

"I thought you said this was a cakewalk!"

Turner blinks. "Wasn't it?"

"That thing – that thing tried…." Bobby shakes his head. "You okay?"

"Never better!"

"Jesus, it sounded like you broke your ribs."

"Singer…" Turner rolls his eyes. "You gotta learn to take a few knocks, man."

"I can take knocks," Bobby glares.

"Alright then. I don't doubt it. Come on, I'll buy you a beer, celebrate your first hunt."

"Beer sounds good." Whiskey sounds better, but it seems like Bobby's got a lot to learn, and if he isn't going to kill himself, it would probably be a good idea to preserve his brain and liver. "Thanks, Turner."

"Hey," Turner looks up from unlocking the car, looks down again: "Call me Rufus."

TBC


	4. Chapter 4

This time when Tur - Rufus leaves, he deigns to leave a phone number.

"That's my sister," he explains. "She generally knows where I am."

"She's a hunter too?"

"Nah, she's a kindergarten teacher down in Omaha. Married, couple of kids…real respectable. " Rufus half-smirks. "She knows the deal though."  
Bobby looks at him. He's learned that sometimes looking at Rufus and waiting produces the best results.

"Our parents," Rufus says shortly. "It was a poltergeist."

"I'm sorry," Bobby says.

"I was sixteen. Hannah was twenty and away at college for most of it, but she saw enough to know what's real."

"And…her family?"

"Got no idea," says Rufus sharply. "So when someone answers that number, you ask for Mrs. Hannah Delacroix, and don't talk to nobody else. Say you're a business associate of mine. She'll know what it means."

"Got it."

"Alright. Now I got reports of something in ND snacking on campers. You ain't ready for that kind of creature. Go get those books, brush up on your shootin, then we'll talk again."

"Brush – I shot that thing!" Bobby objects. "I got it off you."

"Yeah, but you hesitated," Rufus says without judgement.

There's – really no good answer to that. Bobby knows why he hesitated, but he supposes the reason won't matter to Rufus. He needs to be automatic about it, machine-like. Could also do with increasing his stamina, to be honest with himself.

"Alright," Bobby agrees. "Take the truck."

Rufus narrows his eyes and pretends to consider. "Seems sensible," he admits. He carts some of the stuff from the Arrow to the restored compact. Bobby winces a little at thought of Rufus driving the vehicle he just repaired, but he figures he owes the guy. A lot.

The dead hunter in Delaware was named Charity Lederman, if the majority of junk mail piled up in the box is to be believed. Bobby easily breaks into her house:  
the walls and floor are covered in arcane symbols but there's little to keep out a common human. There's a herb garden out back. Vandals already got to it – plants are torn up and tossed with their roots reaching weakly to the sky, coke cans and cigarette butts in the soil. The house isn't touched yet, despite the ease of entrance: fear, maybe.

It takes Bobby back – he's broken into a place or two in the time, in the years between his folks and – all that, and landing that job laying asphalt in Rapid City. Mostly derelicts. This place isn't derelict, though it's unkempt: books everywhere, dust and – bottles. Huh. Seems drinking is a habit in the hunting community, not that he's one to talk. There's also a pantry that, when someone finds it, will secure the late Ms. Lederman's reputation as a witch. It's full of jars, dried plants and metal basins. He peers closer at the contents of a jar and then recoils – that was definitely a bone.

He gathers as many books as he can bag. There's no library – they're all over the place. Titles range from the _Daemonologie_ of James I to _The World of the Jinn_ to _Vampires: Myth and Truth_. They're all annotated: helpfully, some have 'CRAP' written in bold beneath the title pages, and these he discards. He prioritises the biggest and heaviest: also old books. A hunch tells him books from the days when more people believed in the truth are more valuable.

When he's done, he looks stands and looks around the place. he feels like he ought to do or say something. Charity Lederman lived and died here, probably saved a lot of people one way or another. all he knows is that she read a lot, drank a lot, and got old by hunter standards. He says, 'Ma'am,' to the empty air, and feels like an idiot, but then he has an idea. when grandpa Singer was toasting his army buddies, he used to get a bottle and tip good whiskey on the ground. Waste of drink, Bobby's dad had said, but now he thinks he gets it. he finds one of the bottles that still got a decent amount inside. The place is full of flammables already, not like one little spill's gonna make any difference.

"Rest in peace, Ms. Linderman," he says as he tips a few drops of good whiskey on the dusty floorboards.

It catches a little in his throat.

Rufus doesn't call again for several weeks. Bobby reads. The world of the supernatural is deep and vast and fascinating. Now he believes that there's more things in heaven and earth, he rapidly finds himself absorbed, pencilling his own notes and questions next to Lederman's colorful comments. Drawn again and again to the chapters on demons, though it's tearing at a wound, he fills notebook after notebook with abbreviated legends, protection charms and wards.

The chapters on possession are the worst. he can't not read them, though he frequently has to put the book down. when a demon possesses a person it suppresses the personality – but victims report being 'awake' for some of it. they can remember the Thing inside them, some a little, some a lot, how it used their body and voice as they looked on, helpless. He's had one hope - that Karen didn't know how she died - and now he believes that unlikely.

In the third week he calls the sister, who informs him that her brother is in Iowa, fine, busy, tracking down a werewolf and doesn't need any help. She talks quietly and quickly, clearly none too happy to be discussing it, and calls,

"No-one honey, just a telemarketer," to someone in the background.

Bobby realises then that he wasn't calling because he was worried about Rufus. He was calling because he's lonely.

"Anything in that library on Olitiau?"

Turner doesn't bother with niceties.

"Well – what – kind of thing is it? Spirit? Monster? " Bobby's at least learned enough to start asking the right questions.

"Creature, corporeal."

Bobby has several bestiaries now, he's already reaching for the one he's found most useful and turning to the index. There's nothing under 'Olitiau', but an entry for 'bat, cave' (the book is too old for the maker to appreciate the cultural reference). These cave bats seem to have originated in Central Africa, a kind of humanoid reptile/winged rodent (reports vary). They prefer forest caves, and dine on meat. They aren't particular about what kind. From the late 18th century, a handful of people have claimed encounters in Mississippi, Tennessee and New Orleans, and the author speculates on how a cave bat could have crossed over by slave ship: stowed away as a means to catch easy prey, or captured by slavers as some kind of exotic beast? Scribbled in the margin is, AKA OLITAU AND KONGOMATU. Bobby tries an older collection of traveller's tales, boasting to document 'Straynge, Marvellous and verie Horryble Discoveries of the New Worlde'.  
The chapter on Central Africa mentions the Kongumatu:

_This is a Thing whiche is lyke a DRAGON; that the Peoples of CENTRALL and NORTHERN AFRICA assure us hath harassed them many times. It is a winged beast, with a great beake and horryble tallons, and its hide is lyke to leather. CHURCHILL in his recent VOYAGES hath this assurance from MR JOHN BARBOT, then AGENT-GENERAL of the ROYAL COMPANY OF AFRICA that he himself heard from the natives:_

_there are winged serpents or dragons having a forked tail and a prodigious wide mouth, full of sharp teeth, extremely mischievous to mankind, and more particularly to small children._

_Sometimes these Peoples do worship and revere these Kongumatu, as they call it, as gods, but others hold them in great fear and loathing. Their priests, that is the practitioners of HOODOO, have by ingeniouse methods discovered that the Beast may be killed with a blessed speare properly prepared._

In the margin Lederman has annotated, 'Any blade that will pierce. Must be genuine hoodoo priest not bullshit'.

Bobby calls Rufus' sister back.

"I got some information Rufus was looking for."

"Alright, tell me, I'll let him know."

"No," Bobby hears himself say. "I'll tell him myself. Tell me how to contact him."

Pause. "Why?"

"I want in on the hunt."

"You know Rufus works alone."

"Not always. I helped him get rid of a ghost a few weeks back."

Pause. Muttering. In background he can hear paper rustling.

"He's at the Sleep Rite motel in Yazoo City, MS." She rattles off a number. "Ask for Luther Vandross."

Bobby snorts a little. "Really?"

"The places my brother stays don't exactly ID check." It's crisp: the first Bobby has heard from her that sounds like a real emotion.

"Okay." Pause. "Thanks."

"Alright. Listen…" her voice lowers. "I'm, um, glad my brother's not going it alone. That he's letting someone help."

Bobby wants to say something self-depreciating about how much help he'll be, but something holds him back.

"That's okay," he says. "I'll, uh, do my best to look out for him."

"Thank you," she says, and hangs up.

Bobby dials the motel.

TBC

A/N: Excerpt from Churchill's Collection of Voyages (1746), attributed to John Barber, is real, and can be found on p. 213 of vol v.


	5. Chapter 5

Yazoo City sprawls between the hills and delta of the Mississippi river, gray-brown against deep green. It's hot: not sunshine hot but heavy, breathless humidity, the windscreen of the Landau Coupe fogging faster than the wipers can erase it. Bobby's vague with tiredness: he set out as soon as he hung up on the endless ringing he got from the motel, driving like a man on a mission he doesn't understand, and made the 15hr journey in less than 12. He never used to drive like that before Karen. He's also sweltering: he can't decide whether opening the windows makes it better or worse. He's never been so far South before. People live in this.

Downtown, the first thing he notices is that all the buildings look the same: turn of the century, solid and imposing, a touch of neo-Roman stopping short of pretentious. It's a good look. The second thing he notices is the people. Rufus had commented that South Dakota was a 'White' town, something Bobby never thought twice about or particularly noticed. Yazoo City is not a White town. There are White people – he spots them, mingling and perfectly at home among the majority of Black residents, and for the first time in his life, Bobby's skin color distinguishes him.

Huh.

He finds the motel without too much trouble, half charmed and half discomfited by the thick drawl of the clerk and the maid.

"Bobby!" Rufus is in a great mood, particularly considering Bobby's turning up unannounced. He even slaps him on the cheek a couple of times before standing back to let him enter.

"Got that info you wanted," Bobby says tonelessly.

"Good, good." Rufus rubs his hands. The walls of his motel room are covered in notes and clippings. Several are sketches: something resembling a cross between a bat and a dinosaur, which Bobby recognizes from the descriptions. "Olitiau," Rufus confirms. "Every few years, someone disappears into the swamp. Not enough for the fuzz to notice a pattern. But there are stories: bones, sightings, and an old guy on a fishing trip swears blind he found a bare pile of human bones. Course no-one believes him. Figures he got spooked by a deer carcass. But I talked to the guy, and he doesn't strike me as the spook-easy type."

He goes to the mini-fridge and hands Bobby a beer.

"Couldn't that have been an alligator?" Bobby asks.

"Too far from the water."

Bobby nods. Then: "We need a hoodoo priest."

"Where'd you hear that?"

Bobby sits down and shows him the book. "That's wrong," says Rufus shortly. "They mean voodoo. No hoodoo in  
Africa in those days. It originated here in the States."

"There's a difference?"

Rufus raises an eyebrow. "You might say that." He flips the old book carelessly to the title page: "1817. Some White dude probably heard this new word hoodoo being thrown about and thought it sounded better." He shakes his head. "Get people killed that way. What we need is a voodoo practitioner in contact with the loas. You just remember that, Singer. You write any of this stuff down, you get it right."

Bobby nods. "So….where do we find a voodoo practitioner?"

"This is Mississippi," Rufus says dryly. "We could start with the phone book. The problem is finding the genuine article. I got a few names in mind, though," he muses. "Look, you just drove down from damn South Dakota right? Why don't you chill for a while? Take a nap."

"I – think I will," Bobby says. He's oddly touched.

"Don't touch anything," Rufus nods sharply to the disturbing wall display. "I'll be back in a couple of hours."

He dreams about Karen –_ you broke my heart, Bobby Singer_, blood bubbling over her lips as he twists the knife and the Thing smokes in her eyes.

"Rise and shine!" She demands in a bizarrely deep voice, then he's awake, and Rufus is tossing a paper-wrapped package in his direction. /bobby catches it reflexively. It's hot, soft and smells amazing, and even though he's still sick from the dream he hasn't eaten in 24 hours and he's opening it automatically. It's fish, which he wouldn't ordinarily be blown away by, but it's breadcrumbed and spicy and apparently cooked by God himself in the holy fires of the celestial barbeque, and some kind of fried corn things.

"Catfish and hushpuppies," Turner pats his flat belly. "They know how to cook in the South. Man, I probably gain ten pounds every time I come down here. Anyway -…" he tosses a notepad on the table. "I followed up a few leads on the voodoo priest issue. Pretty sure I got us an appointment with the genuine article."

"When?"

"7pm."

"Not midnight?"

Rufus gives him a flat look, and Bobby knows it was a stupid thing to say.

The priest's name is Paul De Sauveterre. He lives and works in an ordinary house in a street full of modest duplexes. Admittedly everything Bobby knows about voodoo comes from Hollywood, and maybe the visions of dark rooms, charms and dolls are kind of stereotypical, but he at least expected the priest to be wearing robes or something. De Sauveterre is middle-aged, wears a shirt and slacks, and keeps photographs of his wife and grown-up kids on a mantelpiece. A small, terrier-type dog sleeps in a basket behind the couch. the only hint of his – profession? – status? – occupation? – is a kind of amulet, what appears to be a tiny leather bag around his neck and tucked discreetly into his shirt collar.

"Rufus Turner," he says evenly. "Heard mixed reports of you sir."

"Could say the same of you," says Rufus, and they eye each other. "But," admits Rufus. "Seems you're the best bet for a real practitioner around here."

"Seems like," De Sauveterre grins, sudden starling white teeth, and his quick eyes flash to Bobby. "Thought you were the work alone type."

"Not so much these days. This is my partner, Bobby Singer." (And damn if that don't make him stand a little straighter).

"Well, well," says De Sauveterre.

"So," Rufus shifts. He's as intimidated as he ever gets. There iis/i something about the priest, subtle and hard to define, just a kind of contained stillness, powerful and abstract. "There's an Olitiau in Panther Swamp."

De Sauveterre frowns. "Are you sure?"

"Pretty sure. Deaths match the pattern."

"Damn, that's some nerve. The swamp is holy ground. Though the way times are changing…" he shakes his head.  
"Well, uh, we're goin after it….want to bless a few projectiles for us, give us half a chance of coming out alive?"

"_I_ can't," says the priest. Maman Brigitte might, after a little white rum."

"I thought you were the real deal," Bobby can't help objecting. Rufus elbows him:

"Maman Brigitte's a Loa. An Invisible. He's gonna talk to her and ask her to help us out."

"Give me the weapon," says De Sauveterre. Rufus opens his backpack and hands over a set of three broadpoint tips for a crossbow. The priest inspects them, nods, then gets up abruptly – and disappears into a backroom.

Bobby starts to get up. He wants to see this. Rufus looks at him sharply and shakes his head. Bobby sits back down.

De Sauveterre returns almost immediately:

"Call back tomorrow," he says.

"Well – but – can't you summon her now?" asks Bobby.

De Sauveterre smirks. "I don't summon the loas. I serve them. Call back tomorrow."

Bobby looks at Rufus, who shrugs and claps him on the shoulder. "Can't rush the loas, Bobby. What do you say we go sample some more of that fine Mississippi cuisine?"

In the end it takes three days before a loa deigns to help them. The last time they call on De Sauveterre, he's smiling, and hands over the blessed bolts with good wishes. He also gives them a sketch map of part of the swamp, south of the north-west bayou, with a red area circled.

"It's somewhere around there," he tells them.

They head out to the bayou, Rufus with the crossbow and Bobby with a long hunting rifle. His bullets won't kill the Olitiau, but they'll slow it down, and Rufus tells him frankly that he isn't wasting a blessed bolt on a beginner's shot. Bobby sees the logic, and adds 'crossbow training' to his mental to-do list.

Setting foot in the swamp is like setting foot in a hot, wet, oven. It's gorgeous, Bobby can admit that, tall slender trees and shafts of luminous sunlight, steam rising from the boggy ground. Bobby spies an alligator, posed statue-like in the shade of a tree, flickering of one beady eye the only sign of life. Paths are well-kept with food bridges across the wettest parts, but Rufus soon leads them off the beaten track. The ground dries out as they leave the bayou behind them and the trees close in. The heat is stifling.

"Check it out," Rufus nods sharply, and Bobby's eyes follow his to a flash of white in the undergrowth. He turns it over with the butt of his rifle. It's a shard of ankle bone. The ankle bone is, presumably, connected to the foot bones, which are still encased in a bloodstained hiking boot.

Bobby gags a little.

"Hm," says Rufus.

Later on, they find a clump of hair, which could be dismissed as having come from an animal, were it not for the purple elastic band still attached to the lock. They locate the area De Sauveterre marked out, and search in widening circles. Bobby's sweating, eaten alive by bugs. He wonders if they got malaria down here. Wouldn't that be an irony, hunting an Olitiau and taken out by a bug.

Dusk falls.

"What was that?"

A flicker of black in the corner of Bobby's eye. he whirls, gun aimed. Could be a bird. A large bat.

Flicker again between the trees.

"Helloooo, beastie," murmurs Rufus, lifting the crossbow. They stand back to back, tense.

Silence.

"Come out come out….."

Another flicker. It's closer. Then further away.

"Alright," Rufus lowers his weapon. "You up for bait duty?"

"Me? Why not you?!"

"I gotta aim the crossbow."

Bobby pauses.

"I won't let it get you," Rufus rolls his eyes. "Think of it like hunting a really smart deer. A really smart….rabid  
deer. With wings."

"That's comforting."

They find a suitable clearing and Bobby lowers his backpack. "What do you want me to do?"

"Make some noise. Start a fire. Act like a dumb camper. You got any food on you? Something with a scent?"

"Beef jerky?" Bobby offers.

"Eh, better than nothing. I'm gonna head off a little way but I won't let you out of my sight. Then-"

It's upon them before Rufus finishes speaking.

TBC


	6. Chapter 6

'Really smart deer', Bobby thinks dumbly. It's as big as a man and as silent as a hunting owl, gaping fanged jaws and leathery wings and a stench of rotting meat. Twisted beaked face, eyes intent and animal, Bobby's on the ground with the thing on top of him, heart pounding and sick as he fires into it, bullets thudding into its body and causing it to flinch back but not stopping it. Its thrown Rufus to the ground as well, wings big and strong enough to encompass the both of them, and the crossbow has gone skittering from his hands. Rufus starts to get up, tries to reach the bow, but the thing throws him back with one clawed, sinewy arm, and the other plunges into Bobby's shoulder.

For a second he feels nothing beyond the horror of that obscenely wrong thing protruding from his body. Then the pain hits – and he possibly screams, which is a travesty considering what Karen must have endured. the thing moves its other claw and pierces his thigh, opens its beak and puts its head back, absolutely preparing to eat him alive, practically  
unhinging its jaw, and that beak plunges towards him, direct for his face –

- with a swish-thud a bolt from the crossbow pierces its back between the wings, its eyes widen and it makes a choking sound. Then its eyelids fall and it pitches forward, all strength gone from its limbs, collapsing on top of Bobby. Forward momentum tears its hooks from his body, gauging upwards, and he thinks, 'oh, shit', as he feels something gush from his leg. the pain, formerly unbelievable, starts to dim, and at some level he knows that's a bad thing, he's going into shock as the world grays out –  
"Goddamit motherfucker-" Rufus is cursing, pushing and shoving the heavy thing off him, then slapping his face:  
"Singer! Singer you keep your eyes open!"  
He blinks, but dark mist descends.

On TV, people wake from a near-death experience in a hospital, blinking up at a blurred white ceiling and wondering if they're in heaven. Bobby wakes up to the persistent sound of a slow drip, drip, drip, and a grey ceiling with a crack in it, and he's reasonably sure he ain't going to paradise.

"You made it."

He turns his head and immediately regrets it. The speaker – a woman – doesn't sound particularly happy about her pronouncement. Nor does she sound unhappy – it's purely observation. He's lying on something hard but yielding, a thin mattress, and he's…underground. He thinks. Some kind of basement?

He blinks, slowly, and when he opens his eyes there's a face peering over him. It's a woman in late middle-age, whipcord-lean and acerbic, grey hair in a no-nonsense crop and a legitimate, honest-to-god eyepatch over half her face. She's smoking. This definitely isn't a hospital.

"Rufus?" he croaks.

"Taking care of the Olitiau's body," she says. "He stuck around long enough to make sure you weren't checking out. He's a bastard, but not ithat/i much of a bastard."

"You're a hunter?" he tries to ask, but his voice gives out into a squeaky croak, and she helps him sit up and drink water from a plastic bottle. her movements are absolutely impersonal.

"Was one," she says when he's finished drinking, and gestures to her eyepatch. "Nowadays more of a medic. I can see fine, but depth perception went with the eyeball. I can still stitch," she adds a little defensively, and he guesses a worried look must have crossed his face.

"I'm sure," he says hastily. "Uh, thanks."

She shrugs. "You were lucky with the shoulder, but the thigh wound hit the artery. That's why you bled so much. You'll feel like crap for a couple of days but you should be fine. You've only been out a few hours. Lucky," she said again.

Bobby let his head fall back against the pillow. Lucky wasn't the word he would have used. Now that he felt more aware, he realizes the basement resembles a military bunker. There stockpiles of rations, ammunition and several well stocked first aid kits. He slides his eyes left, and realizes that the walls and floor were covered with symbols. He recognizes several from the books as wardings.

He swallows.

"I gotta say," says the woman, "I never thought Turner would be the type to take a partner on. There must be something special about you."

"Or just dumb," Bobby mutters.

"Or that," the woman agrees. "You might as well go on back to sleep, he won't be back for a while."

The medic's name is Jamie, and she lives on her own in a warded house at the edge of the reservation. He's starting to notice a pattern concerning hunters and living alone. Since she's no longer actively hunting things, it seems she's become a kind of contact point/safe house for hunters in the area, and when Rufus comes back, she gives them dinner and rolls out a camp bed for Rufus in the basement. Bobby's plucked up the courage to look at his leg. It isn't so bad. Well, it's bad, obviously, but it isn't too horrible to look at. Just a closed gash with some swelling and redness and a neat line of stitches.

He nearly died.

"I ever tell you about the time I got poisoned by a manticore?"

Bobby slides his eyes across. Rufus is a dark shape on the bunk opposite. His voice is directed at the ceiling.

"No?"

"It was in New York, of all places. Normally try to stay out of big cities, too many cops. But I couldn't get no-one else on it at short notice. Fucker bitch-slapped me with its tail. Didn't think nothing of it, thought I got away easy on that hunt, but the day  
after I started getting sick. Nearly killed me."

Bobby assumes this tale is supposed to bring him comfort.

"Why didn't you die?"

"I'm a tough son of a bitch," Rufus' teeth flash white in the dark. Pause. "Guess you are too."

Oh. They're bonding.

"Guess so," says Bobby.

"Feels good don't it?" Bobby raises his eyebrows even though Rufus can't possibly see him do it. he doesn't feel like death  
anymore. But then, he's on some strong drugs. Good isn't the word he'd use for his present state. Rufus clarifies: "Killing the olitiau."

"Oh! Oh, yeah," Bobby says.

"Think about it," Rufus turns to him. His eyes glint, catching the meager light from the basement window. "That thing killed at least four people. People with lives, families. it would have gone on killing."

"Yeah." It's true, but it feels abstract. He knows he's helped save lives. He guesses this is why Rufus does it, why anyone does it. They can't go back and prevent their own losses, so they spend the rest of their lives hunting for some kind of atonement.  
Or they put their hands up and go batshit insane, one or the other.

He probably feels it for the first time when he comes face to face with a would-be victim, meets the guy's kids, and personally holds off the ghost that's trying to throttle him whilst Rufus burns the bones.

"Thank you," says the guy emotionally, "Thank you so much."

Course it wasn't that simple: the spirit was a jilted lover taking out men who'd had affairs, but the guy's wife had forgiven him, they'd moved on, and hey, Bobby isn't one to judge. What's that his grandma said: 'We're all sinners in our time, Robert'. Doesn't he know it.

Bobby goes back to South Dakota. He reads and collects books. He wouldn't call Rufus his full-time hunting partner, more like an associate, but he calls when he needs information and Bobby joins him on two-man jobs, and eventually he starts taking the simple ones on by himself. Then the slightly more complicated. He talks to Karen every night, avoiding the subject, because he can't exactly ask for her forgiveness but he needs to feel like she's still hearing him, even if it's delusion.

He misses her desperately.

Once Cilla Mills realizes she truly isn't getting any more gossip on Karen, she starts trying to set Bobby up with available women.

"No no no no no," says Rufus, as though Bobby would have considered it. Karen hasn't been gone a year and the proposition of anyone else is like a question posed in a foreign language. "Don't go there."

"I wasn't thinking about it," says Bobby tightly. They're on the phone, but Rufus is in town and has seen Mariana Holmes walk up the drive with a casserole.

"There are hunters in marriages," Rufus says, "Usually because they lost a kid. You don't bring anybody else into this life and you can't keep it a secret from them. This ain't a goddamn superhero movie."

'Your sister does', he wants to say, but that's different: she isn't a hunter.

They kill a rugaru in Michigan, a werewolf in Texas. They salt and burn corpses in Iowa, Minnesota and NC. The good people of Sioux Falls decide regretfully that poor Mr. Singer has finally lost his shit, no doubt brought on by the departure of his wife, but realistically, he was always kind of weird, wasn't he? No-one could really blame her for getting out when she did.

Then Rufus disappears. After a month Bobby calls his sister and gets no connection. After two months he starts tracking down people he met on their hunts. The only person who'll talk to him is Ellen Harvelle, the barkeep and wife of a hunter over in Nebraska, and that's only politeness:

"Ain't heard from Rufus in months, sorry. Don't you worry too much. He'll get back in touch when he's ready."

Feeling vaguely like a teenage girl asking her date's friends if he still likes her, Bobby thanks her and hangs up. He goes back to work on the Honda waiting in bits in the garage.

1982.

"I'm on the trail of a demon."

"What – RUFUS?!"

"Naw, it's the Black pope."

Bobby rolls his eyes. "Where the hell have you been? I thought you were dead."

Rufus chuckles. "Word of advice, son: in this game, don't count a man out till you've burned the body. I been busy. Now, I'm on the trail of a demon in Colorado. Seem to be popping up all over the place….word is, you've been keeping up with your hunting skills – you're quite the name nowadays."

"Uh – I - am?" Bobby's dumbfounded.

"Sure. You know how hunters talk."

Pause. In the year and a half since he's heard from Rufus, hunters have started to turn up at Bobby's place looking for information. It turns out he's pretty good at the research side, and his collection of occult books grows by the day.

"Look, uh," Rufus shuffles the phone: "You don't have to come. I mean if you ain't ready. You can sit this one out of if you don't want-

"I'm ready," Bobby cuts him off. And with that he knows he is. Hell, he's been waiting for this. Leading up to it. His pulse has picked up and he's gripping the phone. This is one of the nightmares that ruined his life. It might even be the same one! Goddamn, he wants his turn at it, and if it kills him, he's sure as shit gonna cause it some pain first.

"Alright then," Rufus says quietly. "I'm in Florence. Meet me at the Super 8 as soon as you can get here."

TBC


	7. Chapter 7

Florence is one part of CO that could still, legitimately, be called rural. The 'Welcome to' sign boasts a population of 3000. Several shops are boarded up. There's a gas station, the Super 8 and a doctor's surgery on the main drag. Not much else.

It's May, and the engine is heating up with the day as the sun climbs. Bobby took the

truck. The motel parking lot has four other vehicles in it, including Rufus's shitty Arrow, miraculously still juddering along. Bobby gains a little respect for it.

"Luther…Vandross?" he asks the clerk, feeling vaguely ridiculous.

"At your service," says Rufus from behind him, and he jumps, nearly drops his pack before Rufus grabs him up in a rough hug, which he awkwardly returns. There's a new scar on Rufus's chin, which he rubs theatrically as he catches Bobby looking.

"'s what you get for shaving with a straight edge," he says, and winks.

"Right," says Bobby.

"You checkin in?" asks the clerk.

"He'll room with me," says Rufus.

The clerk shrugs like, 'your funeral', and goes back to reading the paper.

"So?" Bobby asks once the door's shut behind them. "Fill me in."

"Thing's possessed four people in eight weeks. Kids," Rufus shakes his head. "Gets its jollies possessing children and using them to kill the parents. All the children have some kind of exceptional talent: this last kid was an art prodigy.

"I heard about this," Bobby scans the newspaper Rufus tosses him. "Weren't they blaming those new hand held game things the kids are playing?"

"Yeah," Rufus snorts. "Nothing like a video game to build you up to first degree murder."

_Child murder spree reaches CO_ blares the headline. The piece is a grimly sensationalist account of a fourteen year old, unnamed for legal reasons, who shot both her parents at point-blank range with her daddy's old service pistol. The kid was institutionalized, unsurprisingly, tentatively diagnosed with acute schizophrenia.

"Now the thing is, it's hard to talk to kid witnesses. Hard to get access to them. They're gonna be keeping this one under lock and key. I figure posing as some big wig psychiatrist specializing in child violence is our best bet. You gotta do that one."

"Why me?"

Rufus stares at him. Oh. Yeah. He supposes this is one of those times being White gives you the silent leg-up. Huh.

"I got a few names. From journals and stuff. Pick one and we'll make you up an ID."

This is how Bobby Singer finds himself clean-shaven, in a rented suit, introducing himself as Dr. Walter J. Zimmermann, leading expert in violent pathologies in adolescence to the staff at the state's secure unit.

"Dr. Zimmermann," says the chief psychiatrist, shaking his hand. "It's a pleasure. I must say, I've been wanting to meet you for some time."

"Well," says Bobby.

"I must say, the methodology of your latest article on familial and hereditary co-pathologies preceding psychotic breaks strikes me as flawed. Have you seen Jamison's perspective on the potentials of electrocorticography? Might substantiate some of your more impressionistic findings."

Bobby hears 'electro' and 'cortico' is something to do with brains. He wagers: "Jamison is unethical."

"Well, I can see why you'd think that. The definition of informed consent and all," The psychiatrist nods.

"Exactly," Bobby says. "So, the patient?"

"This way," the doctor leads him down a corridor to private room. It's locked from the outside. Inside it's the notorious white walls, one painting of a bland seascape. A single bed and a bedside cabinet. There's something oppressive about the room which Bobby can't put his finger on for a second and then it hits him: no windows.

On the bed is a mousy-haired girl, small and immature, looking more like ten than fourteen. She sits with her knees drawn up, despondent and staring at nothing. He would have trouble imagining her killing a spider, if he hadn't seen what the thing did to Karen.

"Rosaline, this is Dr. Zimmermann. He's going to talk to you for a while if you don't mind."  
The girl raises brown eyes, shrugs.

"I look forward to your findings," says the doctor to Bobby. "I must admit we haven't gotten far. She doesn't identify with the other personality in any way."

'That's because it wasn't her, you arrogant dick,' Bobby wants to say, but he just nods and the doctor leaves.

"Hi Rosaline," says Bobby. "Can I-"

"What's the point?" She cuts him off. "You won't believe me either."

Determination renewed. Damn, he's angry. He sits down on the floor, meets her eyes and says,

"Try me."

The demon described its kills to Rosaline, showed her what it had done to others before it killed her parents. it showed her how it would carry on, and at Bobby's request, she produces a series of stunningly detailed sketches. Through glimpses of local landmarks, Bobby and Rufus locate its next victim in the west of the state: the founder's statue in the town square tips them off. They know what the boy looks like, but they don't have a name. He's too young for high school, and there's only one middle school in Red Ridge, but hanging around the school gates scoping kids seems like a one-way ticket to jail for either of them. They know he's a chess prodigy, though, and it only takes a few back issues of the local paper before they find mention of Derek MacFarlane winning the state junior championship by some astounding margin, and the grainy black and white photo matches Rosaline's sketch. Derek is the son of Russell and Kathy, owners of MacFarlane's butchers. From there, it's just a matter of the phone book.

So they know who and where the next possession will be, and they know from Rosaline's sketches it will be at night. What they don't know is _which_ night. Typically, the possessions have been a couple of weeks apart, but Rosaline warned that the demon was getting more powerful, that it was angry and vicious and 'ripping through us faster and faster every time'.

Bobby hits the table in anger. Rufus raises an eyebrow.

"All this," Bobby says, "and we still can't stop it possessing the kid."

A second eyebrow joins the first. "Stop it?"

Bobby stares at Rufus and a dark inkling trickles down the back of his mind. "We are _trying_ to stop it."

"Well sure. Permanently."

"And to do that you mean to let it possess the kid."

"You got a better idea? We got to trap it. Only way to trap a demon is to catch it in a host so far as I know. You got anything else from those books of yours, I'm all ears."

Bobby closes his eyes. No, he as nothing else. "We're gonna at least try to save the kid, right?"

"Naturally. Parents too. But sending the demon back to hell is our number one priority."

"You can exorcise it. Without – without hurting the host."

Rufus holds his gaze: "Probably."

They start going into Macfarlane's twice a day – Bobby in the morning, Rufus at closing  
time, buying the smallest amount of meat they can get away with each time without looking suspicious. the family live in the apartment upstairs, and the wife or an older girl are usually at the counter while the dad works in back with the bigger carcasses. knowing what's coming to this family, Bobby's a little queasy with the smell of the shop, the matter-of-fact way the family handle meat, feeding bloody chunks through the grinder with gloved hands or cleaving the heavy bone-in slabs to customer specifications. He catches glimpses of Derek, passing between the counter and store room, relating the baseball scores to his dad and carrying a backpack. When he catches sight of Bobby, nods, and calls, "Mom, customer," before heading out to school. There is absolutely no reason to think he's possessed.

Until there is.

What changes? Bobby can't describe it. Something in the air around him, a kind of static, a mask falling over his eyes, a shuttering effect to his features, a sterner posture? A little of all, but not quite any – its less corporeal than that? He just knows.

"Yep," Rufus confirms when he gets back that evening: "We got to move."

_Why hadn't he known with his own wife?_

"Look," Rufus says, that intermittent mind-reading thing, "Back then you had no frame of reference. What were you supposed to think? My wife is acting a little off: hmm, could be a demon possession. Now you know, so now we can do something about it."

"What, kidnap the kid?" Bobby snaps.

"I was thinking more of a stake-out," Rufus says smoothly, "Jack and Reggie style?"

Bobby looks blank. Rufus huffs: "_48 Hours?_ I'm Eddie Murphy, you're Nick Nolte?"

"If you say so," Bobby drawls.

"Man, you gotta get with the 1980s. Come on, we'll take my car."

TBC.


	8. Chapter 8

"We're gonna get arrested," Bobby sighs, lowering the binoculars from his eyes and leaning back against the seat.

"Got a couple of FBI badges in the dash," Rufus says distractedly, "You're gonna have to quit worrying about that. Guess how many times I've been arrested?"

Bobby narrows his eyes: "No."

"The point _is_, its gonna happen sooner or later. Use your one phonecall to call me, or if I'm there with you call Ellen. We'll figure out something to get you out."

"Well that's comforting." But it kind of is.

The MacFarlanes have drawn their

curtains and only a sliver of light peeks between the drapes of the upstairs apartment. the shop is all shuttered up. every so often the curtain flickers. They keep themselves awake with coffee and avoidance-conversation. Once Rufus asks if Bobby's doing okay, and Bobby has no idea how to take that, so he tells him to shut up and watch.

"This is stupid," Bobby says at least. "We should just go in and-"

"Say sir, ma'am, excuse us, but we have reason to believe your twelve your old son is possessed by a demon. If you'll just allow us to exorcise him-"

"Look!" Bobby says suddenly. The curtains open. The boy, Derek, is standing there, and his eyes are black. he looks right, left, right again, mouth set in a grim line, and as he ducks back into the room the curtain lifts, and they glimpse a woman pinned to the far wall, bloodied,

" -…on second thoughts that'll work perfectly. Let's do it."

They're out of the car, running for the building, and break the lock of the upstairs apartment. Someone screams and they head for the main room. Mr. and Mrs. Macfarlane are pinned to opposite walls, and in the center stands the demon in the body of their son. It wheels on them immediately, but they're ready: Rufus is carrying a motorized water pistol in each hand: vaguely ridiculous, except that they're primed full of grade-A holy water, and as he's shooting and the demon's screaming Bobby's diving for the kid and forcing his hands into iron handcuffs, twisting iron wires around its ankles, and this is the shitty part but they flipped a coin and he lost, what are you gonna do? The thing is supernaturally strong and before he can wrangle it, it sears a path down Bobby's arm with the kid's fingernails and its own mojo. He barely feels it.

"Get downstairs!" Rufus is shouting to the parents, who have fallen to the floor, and they're picking them up and the woman cries,

"Derek, Derek!"

"THAT'S NOT DEREK!" Bobby bellows.

"What the hell is that thing?" screams the father.

"It's a demon," says Rufus almost tiredly: "Y'all get downstairs, don't come up till we say  
it's safe. And don't call anyone! Wait, where's your other kid?"

"Out – out," stammers the father. "

"Alright, go!"

"What are you going to do to my son?" demands the woman. The son in question is currently thrashing on the floor , raging and screaming, Exorcist style. his eyes are pure black.

"We'll get it out of him," Bobby assures her, and that's true one way or another but dammit, God dammit, he is going to save this kid like he couldn't her if it literally kills him.  
They have the kid tied to a chair in the middle of the room now, a devil's trap etched on the floor around him. he's seething, or the thing is within him, a gag on his mouth.

"Exorcizamus te-" Bobby begins.

"Wait-" Rufus jerks a hand out, stopping.

"What?" Bobby looks at him like he's gone crazy.

"What do you want?" Rufus asks the demon.

"Are you nuts?" Bobby demands. What do they all want? Death, pain, destruction?"

The demon seems to agree with him because it laughs, shows the kids teeth.

"Rufus Turner," it croons. "Ain't seen you in a dog's year. Thought you'd a been dead by now  
– though – no, I'd a heard the screams. Lots of us downstairs got a hard-on for _your_ meat." It flicks the boy's tongue, revolting.

"Yeah, guess you'll have to cancel the party," Rufus bites off.

"Oh I don't know about thaaat…" it says silkily. "Mommy and daddy manage to provide us with  
a fair bit of entertainment."

Rufus grits his teeth.

"What are we waiting for? Let me exorcise it!"

"No." Then: "Why are there so many of you on earth now?" he asks the demon.

"Uh, fun?" it suggests, and he sprays it with holy water. It screams, smokes and arches its  
head back. Bobby knows that holy water isn't harmful to the host, but it still sends  
shudders up and down his spine seeing a child's face and body express that degree of pain.

"What's your gameplan?" Rufus asks calmly.

"Game," the demon arches the kid's eyebrow, disturbingly provocative on the young face.  
"That's one way to put it."

Rufus raises the water pistol again. The thing flinches. "What do you care?" it snaps.  
"Nothing you can do about it."

"Well, we'll see." Rufus draws a thin silver blade from his pocket and holds it up.

"Rufus," says Bobby nervously.

"We got to make it talk," Rufus says in a low voice. "We aint gonna get this opportunity again, Bob. I'll hurt the kid as little as possible."

Bobby bites his lip. Rufus knows more than him, books notwithstanding, and if he feels that its crucial to know why the demons are popping up everywhere, well, it probably is. He nods. Rufus starts forward, and carefully, without breaking the devil's trap, cuts a thin line down the outside of one of the boy's cuffed arms. The skin smokes, bubbles, and the demon shrieks.

"Tough guy, huh?" Rufus says sarcastically.

"You call it game," sneers the demon, smoke still rising where the holy water has seared its skin, "You have no conception." Something crosses its face, a quick pleased flash, as thouh it has just said something especially clever.

"So enlighten me," Rufus says evenly, drawing the blade in a longer arc down the other arm.  
The demon gags and spits. Then in chuckles. It looks past Rufus then, looks at Bobby. "The Boy King is born," it says, and then nothing but manic laughter, and Rufus says,

"Exorcise it," in disgust, and Bobby does so.

*

"What the hell did it mean?"

They're back in the car, sitting and staring straight ahead, but they haven't pulled away yet. Derek MacFarlane, superficially injured and profoundly traumatised, is reunited with his frantic parents. They had left to the family's hysterical discussion of whether to tell the sister, whether to tell anyone, should they join a church? They were looking at Bobby and Rufus when they ask this.

"If it'll make you feel better," Rufus shrugs. "Ain't never seen the point in it for myself."

"What did it mean" Bobby asks again.

"You got me," Rufus is staring out the windscreen, unseeingly. "Wasn't that some Egyptian Pharoah?"

"It was happy," Bobby says. "It said it like it got some weapon over us."

"King of the demons," Rufus suggests, and shudders. "Man. If we could put him down…..still,  
can't help hoping I never have to meet the mother personally."

"Their greatest strength shall be their greatest weakness," Bobby says abruptly.

"Huh?"

"It's in some of the demonologies. The older ones. Just came back to me," he shakes his head. "You think it means…if will kill this thing, Hell will collapse? It's their vulnerability."

Rufus looks at him balefully, shrugs his shoulders. "All I know is, we hunters got some bad times up a ahead of us," and turns the radio on.

The end.


End file.
